ONE MONTH DOWN

Hello everyone! 

Can you believe that this is going to be my FIFTH Wednesday? I can't even believe how fast time flies. EXCITING NEWS: I get my travel plans this Friday!!!!!! I cannot even wait. Here is the thing though, the Danish missionaries in our zone got their travel plans a few days ago and only ONE of them got their visa. AH! So, they are all getting temporarily reassigned state side. I could really use your prayers that I get my visa. I do not want to do the reassignment thing. I leave in 14 DAYS! I am so excited to get out of this place and over to Norge! 

Another exciting thing to look forward to is the general relief society broadcast, Saturday the 28th. I WILL BE SINGING IN THE MTC CHOIR! I am so excited. I am not too much of a choir singer, but to get out and drive to salt lake with be worth the singing. Most sisters can read music and harmonize with ease. Unfortunately my qualifications only include practicing in the shower and in the car. Oh well. All the sister missionaries in the mtc will hopefully get to go and be the choir for the broadcast. Look for me on the jumbo-tron, people. If you don't go to the broadcast for the spiritual enlightenment, go to look for Sister Frampton on the screen. 

I am learning more and more about Norway from my teachers and it gets me so excited to arrive. We are learning Bokmal Norwegian which is what the kids in school learn, but a lot of people speack NyNorsk which is totally a different language. I am so nervous about getting there and not being able to understand anyone! Not to mention, in every city there is a different dialect. Oh boy! Norway also has an open immigration policy so there are people from all around the world living there. One of my teachers told us that he met people from over 80 countries while serving there. Crazy! I think I will be speaking a lot of English. Also, missionaries on their P-days do nothing but hike... I am so incredibly excited about that. Thinking about actually being outdoors right now gives me butterflies of excitement. I have also learned about the FREEZING conditions. I knew all along about the weather but hearing someone talk about it that has actually experienced it is pretty intimidating. I've heard everything from hair freezing and breaking off, spit freezing before it hits the ground, mouths freezing to the point where you cannot talk, and hot chocolate freezing in the first 15 minutes of being outside. I am so excited! When I get there in a couple of weeks the days will be close to 6 hours long with sunlight. It will be a whole new world!

 

So here are a few things that just seem normal since being here at the MTC. Short-sleeved dress shirts are just second nature now. I have always hated the short-sleeves with a tie but hey, now I wouldn't even expect anything else. My name tag. It is like my cell phone, except for the fact that I cannot check instagram, send a text or call anyone. I just feel naked without my cute, little, black name tag. I never thought I would say this but how did I even spend so much time on my phone? Where did I even put it? What are phones even good for? I am also used to the judgement looks from surrounding sisters. Every time our two Norwegian districts walk anywhere the elders count the number of glares from sisters towards me. One sister with 12 elders is something you don't see everyday. I wish I could tattoo SOLO on my forehead so they would know I am not actually breaking any rules. The last thing that is just completely normal now is that I get church songs stuck in my head all day every day. Last night I was trying to remember words to an Adele song and I COULDN'T! They were literally lost from my mind. 

So this week I really focused on my goals as a missionary and as a person. "Through goals and plans, our hopes are transformed into action. Goal setting and planning are acts of faith." Thanks Preach My Gospel. I love this quote from Elder M. Russell Ballard, "I am so thoroughly convinced that if we don't set goals in our life and learn how to master the techniques of living to reach our goals, we can reach a ripe old age and look back on our life only to see that we reached but a small part of our full potential. When one learns to master the principles of setting a goal, he will then be able to make a great difference in the results he attains in his life." We should always have personal goals, but also have goals to continue progressing to become like the savior. When studying the scriptures or even thinking about how you could be better, we should pick one Christ-like characteristic to work on. Such as being more charitable, more prayerful, hopeful, patient, obedient, diligent or humble. If we choose one to focus on for a week, write it down and evaluate your progress everyday. It makes a HUGE difference. 

Thanks for all that you guys are doing for me. I can feel your prayers and support every single day. Keep up the good work at whatever you are doing! Pray everyday, the outcome is so worth it. 

"Jesus Christ is the bread of eternal life. By following Him, remembering Him, and having faith in Him we can change and become what we aspire to become" -D. Todd Christofferson

Love you guys,

Sister Frampton

THREE WEEKS

McCall, Donald Kirk and our neighbor Connor Mcgavin

Donald is in our stake and is also, going to Norway.

Connor is going to Cambodia.

Family and Friends,

Can you believe I have been here for three weeks now? It is awesome. The days feel like weeks but the weeks feel like DAYS! I will miss it here for sure when I leave for Norway but I cannot wait to arrive so soon! The language is coming along! I never thought I would be saying that but the gift of tongues is REAL! I pray for help multiple times a day and I definitely am blessed with help. 

My elder companions and I are teaching two "investigators" (they are really our teachers), and we hardly have to stop to think of words to say. Obviously they are super simple lessons but hey, I AM SPEAKING NORSK! 

This week the hardest thing for me to learn was how to tell time! Someone needs to teach those Norsk people the right way to do it. Let me try to explain... First of all, their digital clocks are in military time, and that is how they write it as well. But, they don't tell people the time in military way. So, that is interesting. There is no such thing as hey it's 12:13! They would say it like, "its thirteen minutes past the hour of 12. UM WHAT? But wait, it gets worse. If the minute is in the second quadrant (15-30) you count down to the half of the hour. So let's say it is 12:24. Heaven forbid you just tell the person that it is 12:24. You would say, "Its six minutes until half to 1." This is not a joke people, this is real. I will just stop there to keep you from feeling bad for me/ falling asleep. Just know it is the hardest thing for me to figure out. By the time I do the math to tell the person what time it is, it isn't even the same minute! I'll just hand people my watch to look at themselves if they want to know. 

So, you know how I was determined to beat the mtc female pull-up record? Well, they won't let me kip!!! They think it is cheating..... So there goes that dream. Stupid. Deep down I know that my name belongs on that board though. #crossfitstrong

At our Sunday night devotional, we had brother Heaton come to speak to us. He is head of the administrative department at the MTC. The first thing he did when he got up there was invite his son from the audience to come up and join him. I was like what the heck? Well, to my surprise THE CUTEST (besides Austin) 13 year-old down syndrome boy joins him at the microphone. Brother Heaton asks, "Hey Russell, what do you think of all of these missionaries?" His cute son Russell looks around with THE BIGGEST smile on his face and says, "This is EPIC!" It made everyone smile but it made me cry. Just tears streaming down my face!! I was a little bit embarrassed but it made me miss my best friend so much. I ran up to the front of the room at the end of the meeting and introduced myself. He managed to tell me his favorite sports were soccer and hockey. I loved talking to him. I put out my fist to give him bones and he about broke all four of my fingers. It made me laugh so hard... I am sure he could beat me in an arm wrestle too.

I am so excited to tell you that I was called as zone sister training leader this past week! Our zone is made up of missionaries going to Norway, Sweden, Netherlands, and Denmark so I am in charge of all of the girls in our zone. Since the announcement in October, the first presidency has made sister leaders because of the HUGE jump in sister missionaries. They only called me for our zone because I don't have companions but also because we don't have too many girls. Quick note, they told us that a few months ago in the mtc they had 52% elders and 48% sisters! Anyway, there are district leaders in charge of each classroom and then two zone leaders and I in charge of everyone put together. I feel super blessed that they trust me to be a leader!

Here is your MTC secret for this week. The church/mtc has thought of a really good way to save money, and that is not to hire any custodial workers. Since they have big groups of missionaries have p-days every single day, they require 75 minutes of service on your p-day. Don't get me wrong, service is just great, but I don't know if missionaries quite keep things as clean as professional cleaners would. Yes mom, I would MUCH RATHER weed. This morning we were put in charge of cleaning the showers. Oh yes, they are public showers that probably 40 girls per floor use. One would think that they showers would be clean since that's what they are used for... think again. I cannot tell you how many times I gagged this morning. I have one word for you, HAIR. SO MUCH HAIR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was tempted to just shave my head after cleaning out the drains full of hair balls. 

One more secret is that someone in the cooking staff should be fired this week. I am not one for tator tots, fried french toast sticks, or biscuits and gravy in the mornings. So, I usually get some fruit and hard-boiled eggs. Yesterday I finished peeling the shell of the egg and split it in half. To my surprise it started chirping. Just kidding, but it probably could have. The inside of the egg was still RAW!!! I lost my appetite so fast. I was just grateful that I split it in half first, if I would have just taken a huge bite of it and got that in my mouth.... OH BAD NEWS!

Okay now to the spiritual stuff, I am ALMOST finished reading the Book of Mormon again. Oh man, I love that book so much. I am just starting Moroni so I will be finished today. I hope you all find just a few minutes a day to read. It is the hand book to life and it is literally God's word. I feel so blessed to have a testimony of it and the opportunity to feast from it's words every single day. I love in 3 Nephi went Christ comes to the Americas to bless the people. He takes so much time to heal and visit with every single person. It is such a huge example to me of charity and how we should treat other people. My favorite spiritual quote for the week is, "I believe in Christ like I believe in the sun. Not because I see it, but because by it I see everything else." 

Jeg vet at Jesu Kristi Kirke av Siste Dager Hellige er sannheten. Gud elsker hans barn og vil hjelpe oss føle hans kjærlighet. Hivs vi lese Mormons Bok og be til Gud verdag, Han skall velsigne oss. Jeg elsker Mormons Bok og vet at det kan hjelpe meg med mine problemer. Jeg er så takknemlig for evangelium og min misjon. Jeg er glad i deres! Takk for alt! 

Love you guys! Thank you SO much for the support and the sweet notes of encouragement that I have received. 

xo, 

Søster Frampton

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pictures Sept 4, 2013

Subject: Stayin' alive...

Hi people!

THANK YOU so much for your love, letters, prayers and support these past 14 days. I have needed it and definitely have appreciated it. 

The last time we talked was last Tuesday morning, well Tuesday nights are MTC devotional nights. Last week the devotional was broadcast-ed to all the MTCs around the world because Elder Neil Anderson came to speak to us! It was so fun to hear an apostle speak to all the training missionaries in the world... And we got to see it live! He brought such an amazing spirit with him, as I am sure you could imagine. He spoke on forgetting the word "I" and replacing it with Jesus Christ, companion, investigator or members. It was amazing and it really put perspective on the way I should be thinking while serving my mission. 

So remember how I hated having my dork dot on the Wednesday I arrived? I took EVERY opportunity I could to welcome new missionaries to the MTC last Wednesday and it was a great feeling. I am movin on up to the pro leagues quicker than I expected... I gotta make sure the rookies understand their place. Haha!

Let me just tell ya that fast Sunday's here in the MTC are one of the most trying experiences of my life. If you are receiving this email you probably know me well enough that I am always looking forward to the next meal. Like, always. Having said that, you can also start to conclude that fast Sundays are the hardest days of the month for me. I will admit that fasting one meal that day was always passed off as acceptable in my book. Well, let me just tell you that is IMPOSSIBLE to pull off here... Except if you are diabetic (believe me I thought about lying). I fasted for 24 hours people! Be proud of me. I had a migraine and was in one heck of a mood but I pulled through! Dinner that night was one of the most rewarding meals of my life. Laugh all you want, but that's the cold hard truth. 

I will let you all in on a little secret right now. The MTC resident halls' bathrooms are the most entertaining places in the whole world. Without getting to inappropriate I will just say that I have never laughed harder in my life at other Sisters. One of my favorite activities is to brush my teeth at night and listen to "the shower singers". Girls some how think that when they are in a large, tiled shower room with the curtain pulled shut that they magically turn into Beyonce or something. Its like a full blown concert in the bathrooms at night and I just love it. 99.5% of the time the sisters are off key and vibrato at times that they shouldn't, but every once in a while you get a fairly good singer that was probably star of her concert choir class. I've never heard so many hymns sung in the shower at one time. It is quite exquisite. 

On Monday nights, our zone has gym time at 8pm. Luckily we can go outside and exercise the way that we want. I went running with the other solo sister that I went with last week. (Her name is sister Angerhofer. She is stuck here waiting for her visa). We had done about one lap around the MTC and it just started POURING and thundering AND lightning. Naturally, most all of the other missionaries ran for the doors to keep themselves dry, but not us! We ran 3 miles in the pouring rain watching and listening to the thunder and lightning. It was my form of heaven. I was freezing and soaking wet but was honestly the HAPPIEST I have been since arriving here. 

This language is CRAZY! Sometimes when I sit in class I just think to myself, what is going on right now? I have fallen in love with everything Norwegian. Our teachers reward us with a story from their mission or a cultural insight, if we behave during their lesson. I cannot wait to get there and enjoy the beauty, people and the culture! I feel really good about my progress in the language so far. It boosts my confidence when I explain to one of the other missionaries how to say certain things in Norsk. I have taught 6 different lessons all in Norsk to two different fake investigators already. I cannot wait to be super fluent and not have to even think in English. <Jeg elsker evangelium og mine ledsagare!>

I have yet to get sick of the people I am around, maybe that means that they are sick of me? All 12 elders going to Norge are hilarious and definitely make this experience better. I also love that I get to have Emi in my residence dorm at night. We just laugh and laugh about things that happen in the day. 

I have NOTHING to complain about. I am so happy to be here and love getting up and working hard everyday. Thank you again for all that each one of you does for me! I couldn't be here without the help of people around me. Remember to look outside of yourself and forget the word "I" this week. I pray for all of you and truly hope the best in your lives. 

With all my love,

Sister Frampton

*Pics on the way

NOTICE: This email message is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure or distribution is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy all copies of the original message.